Cups have been used for thousands of years for the purpose of carrying food and drink, as well as for decoration.[6] They may also be used in certain cultural rituals and to hold objects not intended for drinking, such as coins or soup.

Names for different types of cups vary regionally and may overlap. Any transparent cup, regardless of actual composition, is likely to be called a "glass"; therefore, while a cup made of paper is a "paper cup", a transparent one for drinking shots is called a "shot glass", instead.

Disposable cups are intended to be used only once. They are often used by fast-food restaurants to serve beverages. Institutions that provide drinking water, such as offices and hospitals, may also use disposable cups for sanitary reasons.

Some styles of cups are used primarily for alcoholic beverages such as beer, wine, cocktail, and liquor. There are over a dozen distinct styles of cups for drinking beer, depending on the precise variety of beer. The idea that a certain beer should be served in a cup of a certain shape may have been promulgated more for marketing purposes, but there very well may be some basis in fact behind it.[7]Wine glasses also come in different shapes, depending on the color and style of wine that is intended to be served in them.

Many trophies take the form of a cup, often a loving cup. In sports, competitions themselves often take on the name of the cup-shaped trophy awarded.

Many trophies take the form of a large, decorated cup. In the case of the FIFA World Cup or the Sprint Cup Series, the competition itself may grow to take on the name of the trophy that is awarded to the winner. Owing to the common usage of cup-shaped trophies as prizes for the winners, a large number of national and international competitions are called "cups".[12]

In Tarot divination, the suit of cups is associated with the element of water and is regarded as symbolizing emotion, intuition, and the soul.[13][14] Cards that feature cups are often associated with love, relationships, fears, and desires.[13][15]

Cups are an obvious improvement on using cupped hands to hold liquids. They have almost certainly been used since before recorded history, and have been found at archaeological sites throughout the world. Prehistoric cups were sometimes fashioned from shells and hollowed out stones.[16]

In Mesopotamia, cups were made for a variety of purposes, possibly including the transportation and drinking of alcoholic beverages.[17] There is evidence the Roman Empire may have spread the use of cups throughout Europe, with notable examples including silver cups in Wales and a color-changing glass cup in ancient Thrace.[18][19] In England, cups have been discovered which date back to several thousand years, including the Rillaton Gold Cup, about 3,700 years old. Cups were used in the Americas several centuries prior to the European arrivals.[20] Around the Gulf of Mexico, native American societies used the Horse conch for drinking cups, among other purposes.[21]

Historically, monarchs have been concerned about assassination via poisoning. To avoid this fate, they often used dedicated cups, with cup-bearers to guard them. A "divining cup" was supposed to be able to detect poison. In the Bible, Joseph interprets a dream for Pharaoh's cup-bearer,[22] and a silver divining cup plays a key role in his reconciliation with his brothers.

The measuring cup, an adaptation of a simple cup, is a standard tool in cooking that has been in use at least as far back as Roman times. Apart from serving as drinking vessels, cups can be used as an alternative to bowls as a receptacle, especially, for soup.[25] Recipes have been published for cooking various dishes in cups in the microwave.[26]

^Examples include a hollowed stone used to hold pigment for cave painting (seeHistory of technology), and mussel shells used to hold cosmetics, examples of which have been found in Egyptian burial sites